A couple of lesser known tunes from A Certain Ratio’s back catalogue for you today, both real favourites of mine. In 1986 ACR were moving away from the clipped, army shorts, punk-funk of their early years. Force, released in 1986, found them edging towards a more commercial sound. And Then She Smiles is northern jazz/funk/pop but much better than that sounds. Martin Moscrop’s clarinet keeps it all slightly discordant (and isn’t a million miles from 808 State’s Pacific). It’s parent album Force was re-issued by LTM back in 2009 and worth tracking down. I have a cassette copy in one of those cloth-bound boxes Factory went with for a while (Fact 166 fact fans).

In 1987 they signed to A&M and put out several career highs which failed to sell (Good Together, acr:mcr, The Big E, Won’t Stop Loving You) and migrated their way back to independence in the early 90s on Rob’s Records (Rob Gretton’s label). They then released a series of cracking dance/house inspired records including Mello in 1992. Mello came in a variety of versions, including M-People remixes and dubs.Part 1 was the radio friendly one. The 303 Dub is great too.